Sepang: Formula One team Force India`s German driver Adrian Sutil says the VJM04 proved itself a reliable car in the season-opening Australian Grand Prix, in which the outfit managed to finish among points after the exclusion of both Saubers for a technical infringement.
They brought their cars home in 11th and 12th on the road, before the technical infringement by Saubers moved Sutil and Paul di Resta into ninth and 10th in Melbourne and Sutil said it was a good result and a good weekend.
"In general it was a good weekend for us. The car was not so bad," said Sutil. "We expected the worst as the pace wasn`t there in Barcelona during testing. But here it was much better in qualifying, and in the race both cars finished, so it was a good result in the end," he added.
The fact that the drivers now know that there is a strong update package in the pipeline, Sutil said he was hoping to have an interesting race in Malaysia. "It will be quite an interesting race. Let`s see if the rain comes down. I hope so, as it will help us quite a lot! But in the end it`s going to be hard race for us. It`s not my favourite track, but last year I had one of my best results. If you have a good car every circuit is nice!," said Sutil.
Elaborating more on the Melbourne race last weekend, Sutil insisted that the Pirelli tyres "worked really well". "The tyres worked very well, and you could even do a one-stop strategy and it really worked! I had a similar feeling when I was on the soft or hard, the tyre was just lasting and lasting. It was really good. It was surprising, but I think it was a good job from Pirelli."He, however added that the Malaysian circuit might pose some challenge to the tyres. "Let`s see how it is in the next race in Malaysia. That`s going to be a little bit different on tyres, with extreme heat and high speed corners it is always challenging," he said. Asked about his first impression of his teammate, Sutil said, "He`s a really good team-mate, very good to work with. I think he did a solid race weekend in general. He will pick up some speed, but he`s very calm.
"You can see his experience in DTM -- he`s a grown up racing driver already. It`s not like somebody straight out of GP2 who`s may be a little bit wild!" PTI
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